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Republicans running for open Senate seats have, on average, raised more than twice as much as their Democratic counterparts, the Center for Responsive Politics has found. These Republicans have also spent more than twice as much on average as their Democratic opponents. These Republican candidates further reported about 82 percent more cash on hand on average than their Democratic opponents.

The Our Country Deserves Better political action committee of the Tea Party Express helped defeated yet another establishment-favored candidate in a Republican U.S. Senate primary Tuesday night. The Tea Party Express’ PAC spent about $100,000 in the final week of the campaign to aid their favored candidate in Delaware, Christine O’Donnell

Want to know which sitting member of Congress has received the most money from the oil and gas industry? Which lawmaker has received the most from environmentalists? The alternative energy industry? Now you can find that information in one centralized location on OpenSecrets.org — presented with sort-able and down-loadable options for your convenience.

Carte Goodwin, the 36-year-old attorney and former gubernatorial aide nominated by Democratic West Virginia Gov. Joe Manchin to temporarily fill the seat of the late Sen. Robert Byrd (D-W.Va.), may be a rising political star, but he hasn’t left a long trail of federal-level campaign contributions in his wake.

During Elena Kagan’s confirmation hearings last week, Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, the high court’s major campaign finance ruling from January that overturned a ban on independent expenditures in federal elections funded by corporations and unions, was mentioned by name a whopping 87 times, according to a Center for Responsive Politics review of the hearings’ transcripts.

At least seven members of Congress reported holding a minimum of $15,000 in BP stock at the end of 2009, according to a preliminary analysis of personal financial disclosure reports by the Center for Responsive Politics.

OBAMA MAY ADDRESS DADT IN SOTU: Senate Armed Forces Committee Chairman Carl Levin (D-Mich.) announced Monday that he would postpone a hearing slated for this week on the military’s controversial “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” policy. News outlets are now reporting that Levin was asked to postpone the hearing until after President Obama’s State of the Union address on Wednesday, so that Obama could weigh in on the subject.

As the U.S. Senate weighs contentious changes to federal abortion policy, the Center for Responsive Politics has also found that pro-choice interests have given sitting senators roughly six times as much as pro-life interests have contributed to them. CRP has further found that senators who voted in favor of tabling an anti-abortion amendment offered by Sen. Ben Nelson (D-Neb.) received an average of nearly $60,000 from abortion rights supporters and an average of just $80 from anti-abortion interests over the past 20 years.

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